Tesfaye Urgessa, Self-Portrait IV, 2020. Courtesy of the artist and Addis Fine Art.
"In what gallery director Eike Schmidt describes as "the most diverse room" of paintings in the Uffizi, self-portraits by contemporary artists Yayoi Kusama and Tesfaye Urgessa -- from Japan and Ethiopia respectively -- sit above works by Marc Chagall and Renato Guttuso.
They are the first paintings by artists of color to go on permanent display in the Uffizi itself. Other works -- mainly in other materials -- are displayed in Palazzo Pitti, the former palace of the Medici family which is now another outpost of the Uffizi complex.
"As we get closer to the contemporary age, it's very important that paradigms have shifted, and so have our paradigms shifted," Schmidt told CNN."
